*Privacy Policy: When you subscribe to Vegetarians in Paradise (vegetarian e-zine) your email address will not be sold or rented, and will only be used to let you know in an email what's new in our monthy web magazine.

Let's face it. What this country needs is a warning label placed on each package of meat--something like the one on all packages of cigarettes, but maybe more colorful.

All of us have come to realize that Meat is Dangerous and even KILLS.

These are typical of some of the recent news headlines that convey that message:

"E. coli Infections in Ohio Traced to Contaminated Meat"

"Discovery of Mad Cow in California Was Stroke of Luck"

"The Sad Saga of 'Pink Slime' -- You Can't Fix Stupid"

"Eating red meat regularly 'dramatically increases the risk of death from heart disease'"

"Eat Red Meat and Die? Really?"

"Salmonella-tainted turkey meat blamed for deadly outbreak"

But back to the contest.

Our idea was to sponsor a contest with our readers submitting their ideas for a Meat Warning Label. Since we are a nonprofit without a lavish spending budget, we are unable to offer cash prizes or expensive gifts.

In this contest everyone automatically becomes a winner because each submission will be published on this website, Facebook, and Pinterest as well as shared on a number of other websites sympathetic to this cause.

Our goal is to splash Meat Warning Labels across the internet. With enough entries we will possibly gain the attention to further this cause.

So here are the contest rules:

Meat Warning Label Contest

Send a jpg version of your warning label attached to your email to vegparadise@vegparadise.com/.

Submit as many entries as you wish.

All entries will credit you by name unless you wish to remain anonymous.Do not use trademarked or copyright illustrations in your submission.

All entrants should tell others about the contest on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media to help take the message viral.

We all realize that achieving a warning label on meat products is an uphill battle. Powerful interests can purchase votes in Congress and persuade the Surgeon General to ignore this request. Anyone who reads about Smoking and Health: Report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon Generalissued in 1964 will understand it was the culmination of an intense battle against powerful cigarette interests. Because of public pressure, Congress finally bowed to public demand by passing the Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act the following year.

Sixty million pounds of contaminated beef, pork, chicken, and turkey products were recalled in 2011 alone. We know that meat makes people sick and even results in death. Researchers and scientists began making the association between smoking and lung cancer as early as 1900, but it took more than 60 years to take action.

Let's not wait decades to warn people about the dangers of consuming meat as we did with cigarettes. The time is now to place warning labels on all meat. Turn your creativity loose and make it happen.